A bunch of swindlers south of the border
Matthew Brennan
Issue date: 8/31/07 Section: Lifestyle
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Early in "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (John Huston, 1948), there's a barroom brawl that seems to sum up the whole film. Fred C. Dobbs (Humphrey Bogart) and his buddy Curtin (Tim Holt), two drifters languishing in the Mexican hamlet of Tampico - how they got there is anyone's guess, including their own - confront their first swindler, a man named Pat McCormick who hired them for a job and never paid.
The fighting isn't fast or fancy; no one's a quick draw or a sharpshooter. Instead, the fisticuffs are slow and awkward and unfailingly human; it's a sloppy fight, with men crawling on the ground and clawing at each other's legs. The other men in the bar stand idly by, watching these Americans make fools of themselves in a land they fail to understand. And though Dobbs and Curtin win the battle, there's no clear winner once the film's bigger picture emerges: The money they get from McCormick leads, almost fatefully, to their ruin.
This isn't your normal Western with Gary Cooper standing up at high noon waiting for judgment to come; you're witnessing a tragedy (in the Greek sense), Dobbs' rise to riches and fall, staggering and dusty, into the ditch where he'll be left to die.
Dobbs may be Bogey's darkest creation, a conspiracy theorist who thinks his partners will steal his money or get him killed by bandits. He's got a face like a dirt road, recording every track of foot, hoof or tire across its crevasses. Even clean-shaven, his sunken cheeks throw dark shadows across his face, creating an ambiguous charm. As the film's antihero, who leaves with Curtin and a grizzled, old prospector (Walter Huston, the director's father) in search of the mother lode, you can see distrust flash across his face, cleaving it in two. "Fred C. Dobbs," he says emblematically, "ain't a guy that likes being taken advantage of."
Every tragic hero has a tragic flaw, and Dobbs' inability to trust is what brings him low. In the climactic scene, set in a rocky, raw, firelit campsite, his distrust turns terrifying. Trying to stay awake all night so Curtin doesn't make off with his share, Bogey's smile turns delirious, his mouth stretching into a maniacal grimace. He's lost his grip on reality, turned into a ghoul of sorts, exacting vengeance for uncommitted crimes.
The fighting isn't fast or fancy; no one's a quick draw or a sharpshooter. Instead, the fisticuffs are slow and awkward and unfailingly human; it's a sloppy fight, with men crawling on the ground and clawing at each other's legs. The other men in the bar stand idly by, watching these Americans make fools of themselves in a land they fail to understand. And though Dobbs and Curtin win the battle, there's no clear winner once the film's bigger picture emerges: The money they get from McCormick leads, almost fatefully, to their ruin.
This isn't your normal Western with Gary Cooper standing up at high noon waiting for judgment to come; you're witnessing a tragedy (in the Greek sense), Dobbs' rise to riches and fall, staggering and dusty, into the ditch where he'll be left to die.
Dobbs may be Bogey's darkest creation, a conspiracy theorist who thinks his partners will steal his money or get him killed by bandits. He's got a face like a dirt road, recording every track of foot, hoof or tire across its crevasses. Even clean-shaven, his sunken cheeks throw dark shadows across his face, creating an ambiguous charm. As the film's antihero, who leaves with Curtin and a grizzled, old prospector (Walter Huston, the director's father) in search of the mother lode, you can see distrust flash across his face, cleaving it in two. "Fred C. Dobbs," he says emblematically, "ain't a guy that likes being taken advantage of."
Every tragic hero has a tragic flaw, and Dobbs' inability to trust is what brings him low. In the climactic scene, set in a rocky, raw, firelit campsite, his distrust turns terrifying. Trying to stay awake all night so Curtin doesn't make off with his share, Bogey's smile turns delirious, his mouth stretching into a maniacal grimace. He's lost his grip on reality, turned into a ghoul of sorts, exacting vengeance for uncommitted crimes.
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